End of a Strenuous Life

A switch flicked. The microphone in the
Secretary of the Navy's office came alive. Along the cavernous halls of
the sprawling ten-winged Navy Building, up & down the corridors of the
Navy Annex across the Potomac, through all the temporary Navy buildings
cluttering the Mall, boomed the taut voice of Under Secretary James V.
Forrestal: It is with profound regret that I announce to the naval
service the death of the Secretary of the Navy.

Thus last week the 30,000 Washington-based Navy personnel heard of the
death of Secretary William Franklin Knox. The nation  which had been
given but...